


take another drag, turn me to ashes.

by peachmaisie



Category: The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Diners, Alternate Universe - Truckers, F/M, Fluff and Angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-25
Updated: 2019-01-25
Packaged: 2019-10-16 01:00:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17539673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peachmaisie/pseuds/peachmaisie
Summary: "Your breakfast special," She said simply before siding the plate in front of Frank, busy rubbing at her nose with her other hand. She looked exhausted, to say the least, purple circling her eyes and face gaunt, sharp with pale edges.Frank had travelled all across the country, spent years on the road and he'd met plenty of people wrestling the urge to follow in his footprints. Few people seemed happy where they were, but it was home and home was difficult to leave, the only reason he'd been able to was that there had been no choice in the matter. The point being, he recognised the face of someone whose home was eating them alive."More coffee?" Karen asked with the voice of someone who was holding back a yawn, Frank gave a small nod to her offer before starting to eat. It was by no means the best breakfast he'd tasted, the eggs were undercooked slightly and the bacon verged on being burnt rather than crispy but like most things, Frank didn't care. He simply continued to eat like a man who'd been given his first meal in months as Karen poured his coffee, eyeing him up slyly. "So what brings you around here?"





	take another drag, turn me to ashes.

On some nights, the roads ahead of Frank seemed to stretch on infinitely, never curving to halts or into quaint little towns. Time became merely something he once knew, with nothing but lampposts racing by, glowing like fireflies amongst the dark to indicate that he was, in fact, moving at all.

It wasn't a complaint. If it was then Frank wouldn't have been there in the first place, however, there was something peaceful about how detached the world became he drove at night. He could remove himself from everything that had and would happen, he could pretend that he didn't exist at all.

The night would slowly shift into morning and the dead would rise in the form of Hondas and bubblegum pop blasting out of windows. The roads that once felt like they were highways to nowhere would merge into carriageways to cities and homes, where families were waiting and jobs were left needing to be done.

Frank's home consisted of coffee cups and a broken air conditioner, it was the photograph he kept tucked away in the glove compartment and the low hum his truck made as they drove together on dark nights. He wasn't running from home, he'd taken whatever he had left of his life and did his best to bring it along with him.

For the majority of the time, there was rarely ever a destination he was heading towards in particular, the roads would take him where they wanted and he didn't care where he would end up. Perhaps that was why he liked driving at night, he didn't have to make the decisions as to where he was going. For a few hours, he could drift away, driving down the straight and narrow and feel at utter peace at the loneliness that overcame him.

It wasn't a bad life per se, there was a lot of nice scenery and sometimes he'd wander around the little towns he came across, looking like a foreigner in his own country. He didn't live completely in his truck like some people liked to think. Sure, he spent almost all of his time alone but it was safer that way, Frank preferred it that way.

The lights from an upcoming truck stop brought Frank out of his thoughts, neon pink humming in the darkness and fighting for dominance with the warm glow the lampposts gave off. He glanced down at his gas, there was enough to make it to the next station but he was tired and didn't feel like driving for another few miles. Another glance up to the mirror told him there were no cars behind him, he had arrived back in the ghost town.

Upon pulling into the stop, he took note of how there were a few trucks parked up, not as many as he was used to seeing. He wasn't the only man out there seeking something in the dark, nor was he the only one who found comfort in it.

Halting to slow and whining stop, the low music from the radio silenced and Frank was suddenly left sat alone in the dark. It was only once he'd grabbed his bag and clambered out of the trunk and closed the door with a heavy thump that he caught a glimpse of himself in the wing mirror. For a second, he didn't recognize his own reflection, too much dark curls and scruffy beard to ever look like what he once remembered, maybe that was for the best.

The asphalt creaked beneath the heavy soles of his boots, small chunks coming up from the daily assault. Now outside of his truck, Frank could hear music coming from one of the diners stacked beside one another, the smell of grease and coffee hitting him as he walked by an open door leading into a pastel 50s dream. The low growl in his stomach was no new feeling and could wait until morning to be tamed, with more black coffee most likely.

A motel sat at the very edge of the pull in, small and not very extravagant which meant it was perfect. Upon walking inside a small bell rang from above the door, notifying the lady sat half asleep behind the desk that someone was waiting to be served.  
She awoke with an abrupt snort, almost falling backwards off from her chair but quickly catching herself. With as much delicacy as a woman who'd just brushed death (or at least a rough headache,) she reached under the desk and pulled out a set of keys, dropping them onto the desk with a loud clatter.

"Forty-five for a night." Frank gave a small grunt of acknowledgement before reaching into the pocket of his jacket to wrestle whatever notes he had left in his wallet. His life was of course not all just driving to his heart's content, he picked jobs up along the way that helped him pay for his life of constant drifting. As long as he had enough for gas and coffee, then it was enough to survive.

After handing the cash over and getting a key dropped in his palm in return, the woman told him the room number and to walk around back to find it. And with that, she kicked her feet back up onto the desk, leaned her head back off the edge of the chair and before Frank even had considered leaving she was back to snoring.

The clock perched on the desk read two o'clock and tickled steadily with each passing second. Frank took a few moments to glance around the room, out of date pamphlets to long-dead attractions sat on display and hard boiled sweets in a glass bowl were coated in a thin layer of dust— a ghost town.

The wind rustled through the dead leaves, crunching beneath Frank's boots as he begun to make his way around the welcome building and to the actual motel rooms. They were lined up in a neat row, plants that were once alive but now merely wilted remanences sat outside each door in dusty grey pots, cigarette butts and shattered glass lined the pavement and Frank felt at home in the lack of luxury.

Inside of the room wasn't much of an improvement, a simple bed and chest of drawers sat opposite one another amongst the walls of peeling floral wallpaper. The bathroom barely could be referred to as such with how small it was but Frank had long since worried about things, everything he needed was right there and without the extras. Granted, without any sort of comfort as well but that wasn't a bother either.

Dumping his bag onto the ground then swiftly following it with his jacket, Frank kicked off his heavy boots before beginning to wander around the motel room. The light bulb flickered above him as he walked, his black henley soon joining the pile of his belongings splayed out on the floor. There wasn't much to look at but it wasn't as though he'd been expecting a fine art gallery in a place time was clearly starting to forget.

Frank sat down on the edge of the bed and it creaked beneath his weight, a low whine from the springs of the well-used mattress. Once the creaking stopped, he was back in the silence and back in that feeling of not being quite grounded in reality. Existing was an exhausting thing, for some more than others.

After Frank laid back onto the bed, his socked feet hanging off the edge, he stared up at the ceiling light. He continued to stare until it was blurry with his thoughts, the desperate want to not be thinking about things he had been trying to let go. It wasn't as easy as it sounded, then again maybe it didn't sound easy at all. Eventually, his vision blurred into black and he was asleep, still half clothed and laying a top of the sheets- probably for the best considering the cleanliness.

The world, of course, continued to spin as Frank slept, the sky shifting away from navy blue as the sun rose across the horizon. By the Frank came around, sunlight was streaming in through the windows, mostly blocked by the curtains but still allowing enough through to shine on all the dust particles in the air.

The mattress creaked along with Frank's joints as he rolled slowly off of his stomach and onto his back. Until his eyes adjusted to the light, he stared up at the ceiling and scanned thoughtlessly over the textured plaster.

While the bed had been less than comfortable, it was better than the nights he'd spent tucked away on the side of the road, still perched in the driver's seat. Frank wasn't one to complain anyway, merely letting out a low groan as he eventually pulled himself up from the bed.

"Sleep well?" The same woman from the night before asked as Frank walked in to return the room key. She looked well rested, from her awkward posture though he assumed she had slept her chair all night; did she have a bed? Frank didn't ask and instead slid the key across the desk towards her.

"Just fine," Frank replied with the intention of that being the end of the conversation, the feeling was not reciprocated however. Before he had the chance to leave it at that, the woman was speaking again, fast like she knew she only had a little time before Frank was out of the door.

"You should grab somethin' to eat before you head out again, honey." Leaning over the desk, she pointed out of the window to one of the diners a few buildings down. "Karen should be on by now, Penny's Place near the end— hash browns to die for. If she's not there, Kev will look after you."

Frank had already been planning to grab some coffee before heading back out on the road but considering the lack of business the stop was appearing to reel in, a few dollars extra wouldn't hurt and plus some actual food did sound good. After giving a small nod and mumbling thanks, he managed to wiggle out from the conversation and retreated back out to the cool Autumn air.

The inside of Penny's Place, like everything at the truck stop, seemed lost to time. It wouldn't have been a stretch to say the place hadn't been redecorated in years, posters for events long dead remained stuck to the door in what he could only assume was to serve as a distraction for the cracked glass. The wallpaper was peeling, water damage was starting to creep down from the ceiling and Frank wondered if the reason this place had been suggested was a feeble attempt at keeping it afloat.

After walking inside, Frank noticed a family photo nestled beside tacky decorations on the wall. The photo sat in a frame with no glass, the frame itself was cracked indicating it had either fell or been thrown. A family lay smiling, smiles that didn't reach their eyes and with some hands held clenched beside them. A youngish boy on the left, followed by the father and sickly looking mother, on the right stood who he assumed to be the daughter, blonde and looking the most displeased of them all.

A small bell chimed as the door behind him closed and a crash from behind two closed swinging doors followed, moments later a young man hurried out, dark hair and grease coating the tatty apron tied around his waist. He looked to Frank, then behind him through the cracked glass, then to him once more.

"Shit," he mumbled and wiped his hands across the off-white of the apron, biting the inside of his cheek before sighing and addressing his customer, "sorry, uh, I just got here. Sit down and I'll be there in a second." The kid who Frank assumed to be the "Kev" the receptionist had mentioned gestured towards the bar stools before disappearing back into the kitchen.

It wasn't a tough decision to pay little attention to his frantic nature and instead Frank did as told, he strolled over to the bar counter and swung his legs over one of the thick red stools, the covering ripped and the metal creaked beneath his weight. Every in this town felt like that, like too much pressure and the bubble it had found itself in would pop, the rest of the world would finally be able to see them and catch them up to the times.

When he returned with a coffee jug in hand, Frank merely gave a nod of his head and mumbled a gruff thanks before wrapping his hand around the mug slid in his direction. Something was frying in the back, the smell of grease and meat fat in the air made Frank's stomach gurgle in interest. It had been a few days since he'd had a proper meal, something that wasn't canned or a sandwich reduced in the back of a gas station shelf.

"Can I get you anything else?" Frank's eyes flickered down to the name badge sat high on his chest, confirming that this was indeed the Kevin mentioned before, not that it mattered all that much.

"Whatever you've got cookin' back there smells good," Frank said with a small nod towards the kitchen, his voice low and rougher than usual from sleep. Though that wasn't uncommon, not when he spent days or sometimes weeks not saying a word at all. Kevin followed Frank's nod and looked back to the kitchen, pausing for a couple of seconds before nodding himself.

"Oh, yeah— bacon." An unused notebook lay on the counter, the ones usually used for taking orders but that probably wasn't necessary with the low amount of diners Frank assumed the place got. "Want some eggs too?" Frank gave something like a shrug and nod at the same time, Kevin stared blankly before heading towards the kitchen, calling back to Frank as he walked. "I'll go ahead and do you the breakfast special."

When Kevin disappeared back past the swinging doors, Frank finally brought the mug to his lips and took a sip of his coffee. Being freshly brewed, it burned on the way down and fizzled against his tongue but it didn't hurt, somehow. A half-filled sugar jar sat close by but Frank liked his coffee black, both because he'd come to enjoy the taste and because it kept the luxuries on a low, he'd never had that much of a sweet tooth.

A few minutes had passed by before a car rumbled to a halt outside and the front door swung open again with a ring of the bell. Before Frank could turn and see who it was, a swish of blonde hair darted passed him by and he barely caught a glimpse of a woman darting back into the kitchen.

"Where have you been?" Kevin hissed through his teeth and Frank heard every bitter-coated word, he wasn't sat close enough to hear their conversation clearly but enough so to catch the important bits through the sound of frying food.

"Todd got in trouble again, he needed me to bail him out." The woman spoke in hushed tones, far less accusing than that of Kevin's. It was slightly hoarse, her throat rough like the asphalt outside but still a pleasant sound to hear.

While Frank wanted to mind his own business, there wasn't much to look at or listen to apart from the growing spat taking place behind the doors. He took another sip of his coffee and found himself half staring at the menu plastered on the wall in front of him while listening in to the bickering.

"Oh! Okay, that's great." Kevin said with an inflexion that clearly said actually no, things weren't great, they were in fact far from such. "And you used the money, right, Karen? The money you've been saving, we've been saving? Because you had to? You had to go—"

Before he could continue, there was the sudden sound of plates clattering, as though they'd been slammed down as hard as possible. Karen, who Frank had come to realise was probably the blonde in the family photo with the unamused demeanour, didn't quite yell her next sentences but certainly raised her voice, exhaustion and a croak hugging it.

"I didn't come here looking for a god damn lecture!" Karen hissed, allowing no time for Kevin to interject before she continued on. "What did you want me to do? Let him rot in there? After everything he's done for us? It's his money too." With the current state of the diner and the surrounding attractions, it was no surprise that money was of interest. Silence followed Karen's outburst and Frank drew his eyes away from the menu to look to the doors.

Kevin mumbled something Frank couldn't quite hear, then things went back to normal. Plates clattered, bacon sizzled on the pan and Frank continued to sit in silence, taking the occasional sip of his coffee until it was all gone. When it was, he took to taking a glance outside, the few trucks that had been there from the night before had left which meant he was the only visitor still around, how much longer till the next arrived? Before he could think too deep into it, the doors clattered and Karen was walking out with a plate in hand.

"Your breakfast special," She said simply before siding the plate in front of Frank, busy rubbing at her nose with her other hand. She looked exhausted, to say the least, purple circling her eyes and face gaunt, sharp with pale edges. When Frank said nothing, Karen looked up from where she'd been staring at his plate and finally met his gaze.

Frank had travelled all across the country, spent years on the road and he'd met plenty of people wrestling the urge to follow in his footprints. Few people seemed happy where they were, but it was home and home was difficult to leave, the only reason he'd been able to was that there had been no choice in the matter. The point being, he recognised the face of someone whose home was eating them alive.

"More coffee?" Karen asked with the voice of someone who was holding back a yawn, Frank gave a small nod to her offer before starting to eat. It was by no means the best breakfast he'd tasted, the eggs were undercooked slightly and the bacon verged on being burnt rather than crispy but like most things, Frank didn't care. He simply continued to eat like a man who'd been given his first meal in months as Karen poured his coffee, eyeing him up slyly. "So what brings you around here?"

Karen was stalling going back to the kitchen and they both knew it, Frank wasn't much of a talker but considering the desperate look on her face, he humoured her briefly.

"Deliveries." He said around a mouthful of bacon, hot and bitter on his tongue. A squeak from the kitchen followed and then soft pop music started to play, the quality from the old radio was shit but Karen appreciated the cover-up of her voice. She nodded at the reason she'd heard many a time, not so much these days but the memories rung clear in her head.

"Sounds fun," Karen gave a small albeit fake smile before sliding the coffee jug back onto the counter. As Frank continued to stuff his face full, she took the opportunity to give him the once over. He had the whole lumberjack thing going on, a thick beard and dark unruly curls, his own dark circles hanging beneath his eyes. His palms were thick and covered in callouses, his fingertips worn down and rough— it was often men like him who found themselves in this town, carved away by the world until Fagan Corners looked like a half-decent place.

Frank's looked up befoer his eyes dropped down to her nose, more specifically the blood that had begun to trickle out. Before he could even think to say anything, Karen had felt it herself and brought her hand up to rub the feeling away, only to then have the tips of her fingers wet and red. She stood there for a few moments, staring at her fingers and her own blood before mumbling some kind of apology and darting away. The bell rung once more as Karen hurried out the front exit and left Frank alone, watching after her with narrowed eyes.

He left not long after, cash thrown on the counter beside his half-eaten meal and empty coffee mug. Fagan Corners was a small town with their own secrets and dramas and he wasn't interested in knowing the details, he could live without them. His truck grumbled with a low hum as he began to pull out from the stop, leaving Penny's Place merely a dot in the background.

It was only the first visit, he just didn't know it at the time.

**Author's Note:**

> some quick notes: karen and kevin are not teenagers in this story, they've been living in fagan corners for their whole lives and karen is in her mid-twenties. frank is also a little younger as to not make a weird age difference. ok cool.
> 
> check me out on tumblr at ["maggiemurdock"](http://maggiemurdock.tumblr.com/) and on [ patreon](https://www.patreon.com/peachmaisie) !!


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